“Hey!” Marty yelled from a few seats away.
Kristy yelled back, “Not that I don’t love you, Marty! Hi. Natalie, introduce me to the pretty man.”
George cocked an eyebrow. “Pretty?”
“Oh, sexy eyebrow. Can I just call him sexy eyebrow?”
Natalie snorted. “George, meet Kristy. Kristy, George.”
“George…” She frowned. “…does not do you justice. I think I’m going to stick with Sexy Eyebrow.”
Luckily, George laughed at her crazy friend. “Kristy, it’s very nice to meet you. I was lucky enough to have Natalie spill a drink on me earlier.”
“Oh, you poor thing.” She Chininformstroked George’s arm, mouthing “wow!” behind his back when he turned to grab his vodka tonic with the magic ice. “Do you want to join us? We’re going to a movie, and not even a chick flick.”
“Unfortunately, I can’t tonight. Maybe another time, though.” George grinned at Natalie while he reached for a napkin, then the pen in the inside pocket of his shirt. “No chick flicks, huh?”
Kristy said, “Natalie prefers things bloody.”
She rolled her eyes. “Thanks.”
“It’s true.” It was also true that her friend was still stroking George’s arm.
The poor man didn’t even seem to object, he just handed Natalie the napkin. “I prefer things bloody, too. My number. There is an answering service if I’m not there.” Then he pointed the pen in her direction and handed her a napkin. “Yours? Before you escape to your bloody amusement.”
“Haha.” She took it and quickly scribbled her name and number on the napkin. “I feel so twentieth century, exchanging paper.”
“I’m old-fashioned like that.”
“Should I burn this?” She handed him the napkin and got up from the bar. He stood as well. Kristy, luckily, had backed away, but was blatantly staring. “After I memorize the number? Just to be secure, Mr. Paranoia?”
“Just keep it safe.” He ducked down and for a moment, she thought he was going to kiss her.
Her breath caught, but he only murmured in her ear. She could feel his cool breath on her neck when he said, “I’d really hate for you to forget me.”
“Wow.”
“I know.”
“You never meet men like that!” Kristy was practically jumping as they walked toward the theater.
“I do… Okay, I don’t.” She laughed and thought of the phone number tucked carefully into her wallet. “He was really great.”
“Was he smart?”
“I didn’t get the professor vibe off him, but definite street smarts.” Which she preferred, being the daughter of Detective Mark Ellis.
Kristy continued, “Funny?”
“Dry sense of humor, but definitely funny.”
“That’s your favorite kind!”
“I know. Can you stop bouncing?” She was starting to feel like they were attracting attention. She got the crawly feeling that someone was watching. Luckily, she was fairly sure it was just directed at her friend’s antics.
“Oh, and hot. So freaking hot.”
“I was kinda getting the impression that you thought so, considering you wouldn’t let go of his arm.”
“Did you feel it? It’s a really nice arm.” Kristy sighed. “My trainer has arms like that.”
“You still holding that crush? Dan has nice arms. You need to go out with Dan.”
“I can’t.” She pouted. “We work together.”
“He’s nuts about you and has been for years. And you love the geeky kind.”
“Can we talk about you and George-who-should-not-be-named-George some more?”
“Why shouldn’t he be named George?”
“He doesn’t look like a George.” Kristy finally stopped bouncing. “No offense to the Georges of the world, but he just doesn’t look like one. I don’t know, there was something…”
CDespite her bubbly appearance, Kristy had a very keen eye for detail. Natalie’s instincts tripped again. “What?”
Kristy said, “That’s not his name.”
Which was the same thing she’d thought before she’d been distracted by Mr. Attractive Suit and Witty Banter. She’d caught the hesitation before he introduced himself. Was he telling the truth about having an unusual name? Or covering something else? “You know, there was something—”
“Ugh!” Kristy cut her off. “We’re reading too much into this. What possible reason would he have to lie about his name? We need to stop being so suspicious about everything, Nat. We’re both starting to get paranoid. It’s this business, I tell you. And this case.”
“It’s not paranoia if they’re actually after you,” she muttered.
“What?”
“Nothing. Let’s go watch things explode.”
She was up until three that morning again. Natalie knew it wasn’t healthy, but she had spent the entire movie distracted by her week. The weird trip to Boca, the memory loss, the case…
This case.
It was eating at her. She stared at the list of names again.
Consuela Castillo
Alma Florez
Ana Romero
Reina Ortiz
Maria Covarubias
And those were only the ones who had identities. Most of the bodies dumped out in the desert they were still trying to identify. The ones with ID on them were from the odd cache of nine bodies that had been found north of Brawley. She glanced through the notes she’d taken about the five girls.
Born in Guadalajara. No criminal record.
Born in Guanajuato. No criminal record.
Born in Monterrey. No criminal record.
“Reina did, though,” Natalie whispered as she paged through her notes. Reina Ortiz had been arrested for public disruption outside a club in Ensenada last summer. The club was named Bar El Ruso, a nightspot she’d never heard of before, but then, she had friends who were far more familiar with Ensenada than she was. She fired off a quick e-mail to her friend Manuel, hoping he’d get back to her in the morning.
“El Ruso, El Ruso…” Why did it sound familiar?
She shuffled through the stack of papers, chasing a memory. “Got it, got it, got it! Sticky note. Where’s the sticky note?” She could see it in her mind. It had been on a bright green sticky note. The name. She knew she’d heard that name before.
“Ah ha!” Natalie pulled out the paper. It was just peeking out of the edge of one pile, attached to another file from a girl who’d been found near Imperial, one of the few the Border Patrol had been able to identify. She was twenty-two, another Tijuana native who had found her way to Ensenada. Lourdes Miranda had been on the outs with her family, but her younger brother did tell the police she had been working at a bar in Ensenada and sending money to her parents to help pay the bills.
“Bar El Ruso,” she said, skimming over the file.
Tacked onto the first sticky note was another one in yellow. A name she’d jotted down, but Natalie didn’t remember why. She had to get more organized.
Ivan Balankin. For some
reason, simply reading the name to herself made her slightly ill.
Ch=">Iv“Who are you, Ivan?” She hoped Manuel got back to her quickly. “And what do you have to do with Bar El Ruso and these girls’ deaths?”
CHAPTER FIVE
Baojia thought he had perfected patience in the previous 129 years, but his brother-in-law was trying it.
“Rory, ignoring the dead humans for the time being, this needs to be looked into for two reasons. One, it will look very bad for Ernesto if there is an out-of-control vampire draining women and leaving them for the human authorities to find. It’s sloppy. Two, it’s bad for business.”
He sat at his desk, idly tapping a pencil next to the driver’s license picture of Natalie Ellis as he spoke to Rory on the speaker phone. It was not a sufficient picture. She looked pale and unsmiling, nothing like the vibrant young woman he’d spoken to that night at the bar. Rory was huffing and puf
fing on the other end of the line, probably more irritated than concerned that Baojia was thrusting another task on him.
“I just don’t understand why—”
“Nine human women found out in the desert creates headlines, Rory. Headlines that might be picked up by more than local news.”
Her words from the other night rankled him. You don’t know me well enough to have an opinion about what I can and can’t do.
Oh how wrong you are, pretty human.
Baojia continued gently lecturing his brother-in-law. “National news would be the worst. The last thing that our sire’s very profitable clubs and casinos need is a drop in tourism because the national news is speculating about a serial killer in San Diego. It’s not there yet, but if this isn’t dealt with, it could be. Now…” He paused. “If you’ll ask Ernesto, I’d be happy to look into it. It’s closer to me, and the club—”
“I’ll take care of it,” Rory broke in. “I can deal with this. I don’t need your help.”
Great. Now he’d pissed off Paula’s husband, too. He was never getting back home. “Fine. I was only offering because I know you’re busy.”
“Yeah, well…” Rory sounded slightly mollified. “It’s fine. Thanks for the offer, but I’ll get some guys on it.”
“There is an earth vampire who lives outside Brawley. He goes by Tulio. He’s a bit of a hermit, but he can be helpful at times.”
“Money?”
It was always hard to tell with Tulio. The immortal was quite old and very temperamental. “Just feel him out. He doesn’t have much use for human money, but he likes favors. Often just knowing you’ll owe him one is enough. He’s highly territorial, so if there’s been an incursion near him, he won’t like it.”
“Does he recognize Ernesto?”
“As much as he recognizes anyone. Remember, he’s a hermit. He has no interest in politics. But he’s cautious, too.”
“Okay.” He heard Rory shuffling papers. “Thanks for the tip.”
“You’re welcome. And let me know if I can help.”
“I heard you called Ivan’s people.”
It was easy to forget how fast news traveled. “I had some questions for him. Nightclub business.”
“Anything to worry about?”
“I’ll take care of it.”
“Good,” Rory said. “None of us wants trouble with Ivan.”
“ Fo/spa
“Talk to you later.” Rory immediately hung up, which meant the phone switched over to the other call. There was a slight clicking sound, then he heard Dez’s voice.
“—don’t know how long it will take her, Matt. The traffic down there—”
“Dez?” Why was Dez calling? This couldn’t be good.
“Baojia! Natalie’s on her way to Mexico.”
“What?” His fangs dropped and he stood up at his desk, already in motion. “When? Why?”
“I don’t know! She didn’t call me, or I would have tried to talk her out of it. She’s probably pissed at me because I’m still giving her the runaround about our conversation last week.”
He shook his head. “So how do you know she’s on her way to Mexico?”
“She tweeted a picture of the border traffic. I guess she’s stuck there. It’s Friday night—you know how bad it gets around San Ysidro, even on the US side.”
“She’s stuck in traffic?” He strode toward the door and waved for the first waitress he saw. “Get Luis now,” he whispered.
“She was, but I don’t know how long—”
“I’ll take care of it.”
“Do you think she’s going after Ivan?”
Baojia’s heart thumped. He had a feeling it was only a matter of time. He’d gone to her apartment, but the pile of papers scattered over her desk before had been gone, and there was no sign of her notes anywhere. He suspected she had taken them to her office or put them somewhere safer. Part of him was glad she was becoming more cautious, but the other part was just annoyed.
“I don’t know. I’ll do what I can.”
Dez sounded like she was almost in tears. “Baojia—”
“I’ll do what I can, Dez.” He waved Luis over when he saw him coming down the hall and threw a set of keys at him. “I’ll call you later.”
He immediately picked up a pencil and dialed her friend and editor’s number. He heard Kristy pick up.
“Hello?”
“Kristy.” All pretense of the polite man was gone. “This is George. Natalie’s friend from the other night.”
“Oh, hey! Wait, how did you get this number?”
“I need to know whether Natalie is going to Ensenada tonight.”
“What?”
“Ensenada, Kristy. I need to know if she’s going to a club in Ensenada.”
Silence. The friendly girl was gone and a cautious woman answered him. “I don’t know what she told you, but as her editor—”
“My job is in private security, Kristy. In nightclubs. I have information that tells me whoever she is meeting—” Please don’t say Ivan. “—could be dangerous. Very dangerous, Kristy. I need to know if she went there, and I need to know if she’s alone.”
Kristy’s silence told him she was taking the situation seriously, at least. Finally she said, “She called an old friend of ours in Ensenada. Manuel said he’d meet her down there, but she said she needed to go to this bar where a couple of the girls had worked. She was just going to check things out. Maybe talk to a few waitresses. She knows not to—”
“What was the name of the bar?”
“Bar El Ruso. She was following up a lead about some guy named Ivan. Ky nspan>”
He was settled into the back of Luis’s car, mentally taking inventory of the situation, but Luis kept interrupting.
“Boss, this is a bad idea.”
“I know, Luis.”
“We’ve already started the wheels to have a formal meeting between you two. If you just show up at Ruso, it’ll look like you’re being impatient or are dissatisfied with his people. It’s not gonna look good.”
“I know, Luis.”
He shifted in his seat and looked out the window, watching the passing lights of Tijuana. They were still over an hour away. Thanks to Luis’s connections at the crossing, they’d made it through in far less time than he guessed Natalie had, but he suspected she would still beat them there. Why the hell had he promised Dez he would look out for her friend? Why the hell had he put his marks on her? This was turning into a giant headache.
“It’s gonna look like you’re trying to push the meeting up and we haven’t really specified what it’s even about, so he’s going to be suspicious and it’s just the two of us. Why are we doing this?”
“None of your business. Just drive.”
His assistant gave a strangled laugh. “Right. Fine then, what are we going to tell him we’re there about?”
“I’m going to tell him the truth.” Somewhat. “I’m there fetching an errant human. We’ll be fine.”
“This is such a bad idea.”
He tapped his foot in the back seat and tried not to think about Natalie’s laugh. Or her quick wit. Or the smell of her blood. He was forced to admit the damn woman had crept under his skin. The last time that happened, he’d lost focus. People had died. The girl he was supposed to protect had been hurt. Almost killed. And this car ride was taking far too long.
He cursed under his breath and muttered, “I should have just swum.”
“Yeah, because showing up soaking wet to a casual meeting where you’re just going to fetch your girl-toy is so likely.”
His quiet voice didn’t need any emphasis to be chilling. “You are never to refer to Ms. Ellis as a toy of any kind. Do you understand, Luis?”
The young man was silent at first. Finally, he said, “Yes, Boss.”
By the time they had pulled up to the entrance of Bar El Ruso, it was almost eleven o’clock. Baojia had formed no less than seven plans to deal with the situation when they found her. It
would all depend on who she was talking to and whether or not Ivan had noticed her. Luis parked the car and followed him in through the VIP entrance. The one where weapons were not checked. Two fourteen-inch, German-made butterfly swords were strapped to his thighs under his slacks, within easy reach if things became interesting. He hoped he didn’t have to use them, but better safe than sorry. Ivan would expect him to be armed because Ivan would be armed, too. Ivan, however, would not be as subtle.
The guard at the VIP entrance, a tall immortal whose energy registered young, paused for a moment when he saw Baojia, holding up a hand to stop him and Luis. Baojia gave him a suitably disdainful look before he stopped.
“Is he expecting you?” the guard asked in perfect English.
“No.”
“Very well.” He waved someone over, whispered in his ear, then nodded at Baojia. “Welcome to Bar El Ruso.”
As he walked through the black curtain, he blocked out the flashing red a Klas “Welcomnd blue lights that pulsed and lit the club like eerie lightening. He searched for her, finding her by the bar holding another clear cocktail and watching. She hadn’t seen him yet. He pulled Luis closer. “Go. Find Ivan and make our apologies for intruding. I’ll be right behind you.”
“Boss—”
“Go. I don’t think she’s caught his attention yet.” It was a miracle she hadn’t. There appeared to be a cruise ship in town, or some other event, because the bar held more than the average number of Americans. Luckily, Natalie wasn’t the only pale, redheaded girl in the place. He walked toward her casually, pausing when a cocktail waitress passed. His instincts tripped and his fangs fell down.
Blood.
The girl’s pulse called him. Blood. Blood. Blood. Drink.
His mouth dropped open and he growled low in his throat, though he’d already fed that night. His mind raced. What was causing this reaction? He was angry, but that normally didn’t rile his instincts the way this girl had. Then he noticed another waitress. Common enough looking, but her blood also whispered to him.